Camping!

The Bonnema family had another memorable camping weekend in Pentwater!! This one was made more special by having Laura, Gavin, and Nathan there for the weekend too. It's always wonderful to be in Pentwater, the site of our childhood cottage and many family memories! Memories was the theme of the weekend, we decided when we were sitting in the parked van downtown Pentwater Saturday morning after the 16+ straight hour of rain..... "We're making memories" we said. The kids were watching a movie, we were drinking coffee and reading. Waiting for the rain to let up. Yep, it started raining around dinner time Friday night and with the exception of a 2 hour break it did not stop until afternoon on Saturday. This was no ordinary rain, it was hard, steady, rain combined often with thunder and lightning. We "slept" Friday night partly in our tent and partly snuggled in beds with the kids in my parents pop up camper. Their camper had been invaded by mice where they store it, and so as I "slept" with the girls often I would receive some sort of water torture...a drop directly between my eyes that would slowly slide to the back of my head. We put the kids in my parents camper, but because I worried about them in the storms, as soon as thunder clapped, I flew out of my tent in to the dark woods to my parents site. The kids actually did great, no crying and a fair amount of sleeping. Everything was wet, inside and out. Saturday afternoon we were blessed with the sun for most of the day. It was so wonderful, we almost forgot about the nights events. The kids had a blast swimming in the pool, playing in the woods, and 'camping'. We enjoyed a wonderful extended family dinner, shopping, and playing at the park. The kids stayed up until 10:30 playing with glow sticks in the woods next to the campsite. It was magical! Unfortunately, that night brought two more storms, wind and rain. The kids blissfully slept in the tent through it all. I did not...nothing like a thin piece of fabric separating my family from the lightning. The kids slept in wet sleeping bags all night from the tent leaks. Did I mention we forgot our tent zipper broke last year and it was shut with duct tape for the weekend. Whew! Again, Sunday came with sunshine and wind to dry everything out. We were a little tired, but the kids woke with the joy that only comes from camping. They swam some more and we ate ice cream for the third day in a row. We were saddened to say goodbye to Laura, Gavin, and Nathan after an amazing 8 days with them. It was so wonderful to get to know Nathan and spend such wonderful time with them. Another camping weekend in Pentwater full of memories, some funny, some not so great, but mostly wonderful.
Did I mention we threw the tent in the trash at the end of the weekend???? but, I'm sure it will not be the end of our camping days...perhaps the end of our tent camping days however.